Drake’s ‘Views’ Is Nielsen Music’s Top Album of 2016 in the U.S.

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Drake attends the 2016 American Music Awards at Microsoft Theater on Nov. 20, 2016 in Los Angeles. Plus: Overall music consumption up 3%, on-demand streams rise by 39% & vinyl album sales hit a record high.
Drake caps a banner year, as his smash album Views finishes 2016 as the most popular release of the year in the U.S., according to Nielsen Music. The data tracking company reports that the title earned 4.14 million equivalent album units during the year — with 1.61 million of that sum coming from traditional album sales.
The 4.14 million equivalent album units figure is a multi-metric consumption total, which includes traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). The multi-metric formula is also used to compile the weekly Billboard 200 albums chart, which ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S.
(Nielsen Music’s 2016 tracking year ran from Jan. 1 through Dec. 29, 2016. Numbers in this story are rounded.)
Views spent 13 nonconsecutive weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart in 2016 and launched the No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 single “One Dance,” featuring WizKid and Kyla. The song spent 10 weeks at No. 1 between May and July and was Drake’s first No. 1 on the Hot 100 where he was the lead artist — after two previous leaders where he was the featured guest on a track (and both were tunes by Rihanna: “Work” and “What’s My Name?”).
Views’ overall popularity was enhanced by its enormous appeal on streaming services. The set racked up 2.02 million in streaming equivalent album units in 2016 — equaling 3.04 billion streams for the album’s tracks during the year.
Further, in the week that Views debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart, the set garnered a record 245.1 million domestic on-demand streams for its tracks across all streaming services.